Hello everybody, and welcome to Tuesday.

1. Okay, I’m going to stop saying in this newsletter whether I think the Sydney COVID-19 numbers ‘look better’ because I’ll just keep embarrassing myself. 35 new coronavirus cases were reported yesterday, in a spike. Gladys Berejiklian said it was too early to say if the two-week lockdown would be eased at midnight on Friday as planned, and NSW Health is investigating an inner-city party held at the beginning of lockdown where three people tested positive with no known links to other cases.

2. The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) is meeting today, and is expected to make a major policy decision. Governor Philip Lowe is due to take the irregular step of speaking at 4pm, and is anticipated to explain a change in the RBA’s strategy amid Australia’s developing recovery. With Sydney still in lockdown, analysts expect the RBA to avoid rolling back easy monetary policy too quickly, but instead announce greater flexibility in its quantitative easing (QE) program.

3. Airlines say 18,000 Australians are set to be bumped from flights in the next six weeks thanks to reduced flight caps, the Nine papers report. The decision sent the cost of flights into the tens of thousands of dollars. “Over the next six weeks, airlines will need to move 18,000 people from flights, that’s just the maths,” said Barry Abrams, who heads the Board of Airline Representatives of Australia.

4. Paid vaccination leave would protect vulnerable workers against COVID-19 without making them lose income, according to a new report. “The leave entitlement would be a simple means of removing a key barrier to getting vaccinated,” The McKell Institute argues. The federal government recently revealed $11 million in paid leave funding for aged care sector workers, for whom vaccination will be mandatory by mid-September.

5. The past decade has seen a slow transition of women into sectors traditionally dominated by men, analysis from Indeed shows. Now, experts suggest the pandemic has supercharged the trend, with the data also pointing to an acceleration of women both in work and looking for work. Skyrocketing property prices could also be behind the uptick, they say, as households stretch to meet soaring prices.

6. Share trading platform Superhero is expanding its broker offering to Wall Street, launching US trading to Australian users on Monday. Users will be able to buy US stocks and ETFs with zero commission, with Superhero to make a margin on the foreign exchange transactions. It comes as young Australians increasingly look invest in the share market both at home and abroad according to new Superhero research.

7. The number of active Airbnb listings has cratered in Sydney and Melbourne since the dawn of the pandemic. Lockdowns and closed borders have cut off some demand for metro accommodation, while surging house prices may have convinced homeowners to simply sell out. Demand remains relatively high in regional Australia, suggesting domestic travellers are still looking for getaways outside of the city centre.

8. After 27 years, Jeff Bezos is formally handing over the job of Amazon CEO to Andy Jassy. He’s 57, and has $197 billion – 739,489 times the median American’s retirement wealth. Jassy, the current CEO of Amazon Web Services, the company’s cloud platform, steps up to the plate from today.

9. Israeli officials have reinstated some COVID-19 travel restrictions and an indoor mask mandate amid a growing Delta variant outbreak. This is somewhat significant, as the country is upheld as an example of a successful COVID-19 vaccination program. Israel may limit gatherings and impose restrictions on unvaccinated people again this week.

10. Iceland experimented with giving some of its workers a four-day work week. One per cent of Iceland’s workforce participated in two trials. Contrary to claims that working reduced hours could be counterproductive, and actually lead staff members to work longer, the analysis suggests that overall there was no overall loss of productivity or quality of service provided.

BONUS ITEM

Uh huh.

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